F 869 
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M. D. BRAINARD 



MONTEREY CYPRESS 



By 



M^ dTbrainard 



.N\im 



Copyrighted, 19 19, 

By 

M.IRGARET DOU'MNG BRAIN.IRD 



AUG -/ 1^1^ 

©C1.A530471 



Monterey Cypress. 



Within a radius of scarcely five miles together with an 

inland tension of only a few rods, there stands on Point Lo- 

bos and Cypress Point in Monterey County, California, a 

most interesting group of: prehistoric trees widely known as 

the "Monterey Cypress," or, "Cedars of Lebanon." On the 

Points overlooking the Ocean the constant action of the 

fierce winds have forced a peculiar growth. Gnarl-trunked, 

some two to four feet in diameter, their limbs usually twist 

out from the bowl of the tree into long flat sprays which form 

table-like tops at the height of fifty feet from the ground. 

^ Other specimens, from the same cause, develop into grotes- 

jque shapes, the most spectacular being that of a striding 

c;^ ostrich and long-necked crane, weirdly silhouetted against 

■y the sky. Back from the granite shore, partially sheltered 

^ from Ocean winds, the trees produce a more open top while 

-^long straight branches extend down the less rugged bodies 

close to the ground. Inland, shut back by advancing Mon- 

\^ 



terey pines and entirely cut ofif from the ocean winds, the 
habit of growth is pyramidal. 

The tree is a cypress and not a cedar. La Perouse dis- 
covered it in 1786, but, not until Hardweg rediscovered it in 
1846 did it receive from him its first name, "Cupressus Mac- 
rocarpa," the Greek for "large fruited cypress.'' The flat- 
topped growth around Cypress Point bears so strong a re- 
semblance to the Cedar of Lebanon (Cedrus Libana) that 
people non-versed in tree lore have naturally fallen into the 
error of using the misnomer. Writers, too, overshadowed 
by the wonderful stories told by the old stage-drivers of the 
Monterey Peninsula, constantly refer to the Monterey 
Cypress as the "sacred cedar of the Holy Land." 

Alex. Early, a venerable driver for the Hotel Del 
Monte, was, in his time the favorite story-teller of the gulli- 
ble globe trotter. The tree and sand dunes at Cypress Point 
on the "world famous" Seventeen Mile Drive, Alex fea- 
tured in marvelous story. He declared a wonderful race 
lived about the Point thousands of years bygone who planted 
seed brought by them from Syria, from which these "sacred 
trees of Lebanon" sprung; a white marble city with beautiful 
temples of worship buried under the sand dunes, he said, 
held the remains of the vanished race and its work. 



Just where Alex. Early got his "folk lore" none can 
say. The facts of the tree-planting coupled with the 
founding of some temple of worship may have been trans- 
mitted through the aboriginal Indians, as was their custom 
from generation to generation, each generation removed, 
getting a little further from the truth until the story reach- 
ing the imaginative whites, lost its value for truth, under 
glamor and romance. 

Most legends, or traditions and folk lore, be they Jew 
or Gentile, Christian or Savage, hide a truth. This story 
of Alex. Early very greatly modified and coupled with a 
sprig of the "Cupressus Macrocarpa" and its fruit, came 
through our search for further knowledge of the trees, to 
the notice of Dr. Mazziananda, Lord Abbot of the Golden 
Temple of India, while he was in charge of the Budhist 
Educational Bureau of the P. P. I. E. in the Educational 
building during the Panama Pacific Industrial Exposition 
at San Francisco, in 1915. 

Lord Abbot recognized in the story of the unknown 
birthplace of the original trees and their shrouded parent- 
age, a thought worth considering. When we timidly sug- 
gested a likeness to the "Bo-tree," or, more properly the 



*'Bohidruma," the "sacred tree of Buddha" under which 
he received the light — the question in point being with us, 
"how did these aliens get to Point Lobos," the Doctor's 
interest deepened. Quick of mind, this trained scholar 
with the occult eye of the Oriental scientist and naturalist 
began at once a systematic search and research to settle a 
question through records hitherto unknown, a question 
which of late years has involved a world-wide controversy. 

Born in Ispahan, Persia, ninety-one years ago, Lord 
Abbot Mazziniananda is now the oldest monk living of the 
Jaina sect of Buddha. From Oxford, he received his B. A. 
M. A. M. D. ; from Heidelberg, his Ph. D., to which Paris 
and London added M. A. IVL D., and D. Lit. Author, ora- 
tor and linguist of a score of tongues, through indefatigable 
research, Dr. Mazziniananda not only solved the world 
through his lectures delivered from his Bureau, using the 
discovered history and the connecting facts concerned, back- 
ed by statements recorded in documents still in existence. 

His story we here embody in its fullest sense. 

"In the year 420, A. D. five Chinese Buddhist monks 
from Gobina near Pekin, China, set out on a journey to find 



the where abouts of the 'Land of the Western Paradise' and 
to spread the teachings of the Enlightened Buddha on their 
way. On their arrival at the Coast, they constructed a small 
vessel in which they started on their voyage across the Pacific 
Ocean, as it is now called. They were well provisioned with 
food, and wxll supplied with Buddhist literature, statues of 
Buddha and rosaries. After what seems a happy, peaceful 
voyage, they reached the shores of what is now called Cali- 
fornia. Of course, this was nearly 1070 years before the dis- 
covery of America. 

When these monks neared the shores of what is now call- 
ed Monterey Bay, a storm arose and their little vessel was 
wrecked on the rocks, not far from what is now termed Point 
Lobos. They were fortunately washed ashore and after the 
storm had abated, they managed to get a goodly portion of 
their belongings ashore where having found a sheltered spot, 
they rested. Next day, in their quaint yellow robes, they 
searched around the place and accidently came across some 
of the aborigines (an Indian tribe inhabiting that portion of 
the land) with whom they at once became friends on account 
of their peaceful nature; they were made welcome and pro- 
ceeded at once to build a shelter for themselves and to instruct 



and teach the Indians of the Love of God, the principles of 
agriculture and the elements of Education, etc. Having 
brought with them seedlings, cuttings, etc., of the Bodhi 
tree, and having a feeling that they had discovered the 'Land 
of the Western Paradise,' they planted these cuttings and 
nurtured them, and they grew rapidly so that the monks, 
owing to this, said, it must be the 'Buddha's land of the 
Western Paradise,' or the trees would not have grown. 

Some five or six years later, about 427 A. D., two of the 
five monks started on a long journey southward and west- 
ward in a small vessel they had constructed, and eventually, 
they landed on the shores of what is now called Mexico, then, 
belonging to the Toltecs and Aztecs. There they found a 
high type of civilization and were again welcomed and stay- 
ed and taught and constructed temples and statuary, the re- 
mains of which are still standing. In Harper's Magazine 
for August, 1901 is given an account of some Buddhist 
Statues, etc., being unearthed in Mexico. These monks also 
planted some of these same trees as the sprig you so kindly 
sent me, so you see, that Monterey, California and vicinity, 
and the northwestern part of the interior of Mexico are the 
only two places in the Western Hemisphere where they are 
growing. 



These two monks passed away there (in Mexico). 

Coming back now to Monterey, we still find the other 
three monks. Of these, two took an affectionate farewell 
of their brother monk and their Indian friends and returned 
to China about 432 or 435 A. D., and were commanded by 
the then Buddhist Emperor Tsing Fo, of the Han Dynasty 
to write a detailed account of their discovery of the "Land 
of the Western Paradise." This account is preserved among 
the sacred and royal archives of China and Pekin, and an- 
other at the "Gobina Buddhist Monastery." 

The monk who remained at Monterey passed away 
there, presumably, at a ripe old age, having lived to see his 
work prosper and his sacred trees grow to massive giants. 

So much, then, for the origin of the trees, a portion of 
the history of which I am indebted to the Very Reverend 
Ganeih Soto, Deputy Abbot of the Hongwaiyi. 

Now as to the connecting link I make — On the receipt 
of the sprig you so generously sent me by mail and which 
I placed by the Bhoda section I had brought with me, I in- 
stantly recognized the sprig, but after reading your accom- 
panying letter to make doubly sure I was correct, although 



I had no doubt in my own mind, I took the sprig to Mr. 
Hough, an authority on California trees and forestry, and 
later, with the help of Sister Julia Morrow, a most learned 
lady, we searched through volumes of books, lantern slides — 
plain and colored — until we at last found a colored view of 
the tree, and then referred to the Encylopedia of wood and 
trees and found in it, to our joy, also mention of the Bohdi 
tree. We saw the tree was not aboriginal here, but had been 
imported some i lOO or 1500 years or so before. So through 
Sister Julia Morrow's aid (who was manager of an exhibit 
in the Palace of Education on the Floor, at the P. P. I. E.) 
in my research work, we established its identity. 

Each time I spoke at the Exposition in the Exhibit on 
these trees I always told my auditors it was to you that I was 
deeply indebted. I still have and treasure the sprig you sent 
and my section of the Bodhi both of which I placed side by 
side on the Altar in the Exhibit. My brother priests in In- 
dia, Ceylon, Thibit, Burmah, Siam, China, and Japan know 
it also, and thanked me for making the discovery known. 

These trees should by all means be preserved on account 
of their historical value." 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



017 135 507 2 



